Building the Revell 1:72 VIIC u-boat

Building the Revell 1:72 VIIC u-boat

This article is about the Revell 1:72 VIIC u-boat (no. 05015). A famous kit already, and probably one of the largest submarine models around for a decent price (at least as far as I know)
I was surprised to see there wasn't an article about it yet, so I decided to write my own, to give those who are interested in this kit an idea of what it's like to build it....and to encourage others to built this kit as well!
As usual for me, I built this kit OOB. I also didn’t use references etc, I just relied on the Revell instructions and I also used some examples on the internet for painting. So, what I’m trying to say here: don’t use this article as help for an 100% accurate built…..

Part 1: before building....

It's Tuesday, around 17:10.
I was eating a pizza and watching TV. The day before, I ordered a Revell 1:72 VIIC u-boat, and I was hoping it would arrive today....but packages never arrive after 16:00, so I gave up and accepted I had to wait another day for it. But then suddenly the door bell rings. I opened the door and saw the delivery man with a HUGE box on his shoulder. "Is this for you sir?". Yeah!

Part 2: choices....

When I opened the box I saw 2 huge hull parts, 8 sprues, and instruction book, a decal sheet, a paper sheet with flags, wire, and the instructions. I took a quick look at the clock and saw I had to go to work in 5 minutes. I used the time I had got left to take a look in the instructions. I saw I could choose from 6 u-boat versions. Two are early war u-boats with the big saws (net-cutters) on the front of the u-boat and the other four are later-war u-boats without the saws. Other differences can be found in painting/camouflage schemes. I decided to build an early u-boat, the U-552.

Part 3: finally....

Wednesday, around 19:00
Finally I could start building. I was late home from my girlfriend after work the evening before (which isn't a bad thing Jessica! - Martin) and this day I was at school, but now I could really start building! I was excited already, and that's not very surprising. The model is much bigger than my usual 1:35 armour, and it just looks very cool.
The first step is the assembly of the torpedo tubes. You can leave all 4 tubes here open or closed. Unfortunately the two lower torpedo tube doors are a little too big, and so they don't fit. I wanted to leave two doors open anyway, so to make it myself easy, I decided to leave the lower torpedo tubes opened and the top torpedo tubes closed.
After the assembly of the torpedo tubes, the assembly of the two big hull parts followed. Not too hard to do. After cleaning the hull parts from flash etc, I glued the two parts together, and used masking tape to keep it nicely together. I went to bed and let the glue dry for a night...